Chris Blumhofer—Year C Easter 3

Anthony: Let’s do this. Let’s dive into the lectionary text we’ll be discussing. Our first one of the month is Revelation 5:11–14. I’ll be reading from the New Revised Standard Version, the updated edition. It is the Revised Common Lectionary passage for the third Sunday in Easter, May 4.

Then I looked and I heard the voice of many angels surrounding the throne and the living creatures and the elders; they numbered myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, singing with full voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slaughtered to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea and all that is in them, singing, “To the one seated on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!” And the four living creatures said, “Amen!” And the elders fell down and worshiped.

Chris, I’m curious. What would you suggest is the significance of the slaughtered Lamb being on the throne — the imagery of that? We know he’s the roaring Lion. We know he’s the glorious King, slaughtered. But in Revelation he’s shown to us as a slaughtered Lamb. What should we take away from that?

Chris: This is really everything for John. He uses this title a lot in the book of Revelation. The description of Jesus as the Lamb occurs twenty-eight times. That’s not a coincidence. John loves numbers, and twenty-eight, as most of us will remember from school, is seven times four. These are both numbers of completion, perfection. So, we’re seeing in this passage for the first time in the book of Revelation, this designation of Jesus that fits him perfectly for John.

And we’re not ready for this. It’s really a bait and switch. To understand the full whiplash of the scene, we have to go up to the beginning of the chapter where John is seeing this scroll and there’s no one able to open it, and to read the story and let it move forward.

And this angel is there holding it. He’s weeping because he can’t see it opened. And an elder encourages John and says, “Do not weep. See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.” And then he, John looks, and he sees a Lamb.

Revelation is out to surprise us here. The One who overcomes all the evil and all the destruction in the world, the One who breaks all the cycles of sin, has done it, through being faithful to the point of death. And he wants us to imagine the conquering strength of a lion, but to picture, to see, that conquering through faithfulness, purity, holiness in Jesus, the Lamb that was slain.

So here are the strength and the glory of God are revealed in the crucified Jesus. And if you want to know real strength in Revelation, you don’t see real strength until you see love that is strong enough to die for its enemies, to be faithful to the point of death. That’s what strength conquering looks like in Revelation.

So, this Lamb title is one of the key ones for John. It’s not just a title he pulls out of a grab bag of titles for Jesus. Unless Jesus is the Lamb of God, then the whole message of this book unravels because this book is written especially to suffering Christians, people who could, may struggle to do so, but their lives resembled people who were led, as the psalm says, like sheep to the slaughter. They knew that feeling and so to associate them with Jesus, the One who was slain, but has been raised by the Father, that is a crucial way of understanding who God is and also understanding themselves.

Anthony: And it stands in such stark contrast to the empires of this world and triumphalism. We want the Lion, right, to conquer our foes. And yet God comes to us as a Lamb cruciform, laying down his life, which is opposed. That’s why the Kingdom of God is such an alternative form of living, right? And I’m reminded of what Richard Hayes once wrote, that the church community is called to embody that alternative order that stands as a sign of God’s redemptive purposes in the world. And it looks like a Lamb, slaughtered.

I’m curious, Chris. For me, when I come to a text like this — it’s just so glorious, so filled with song and worship. How do you capture that in a homily, in a sermon to a congregation? But I’m going to ask you to do that. How would you herald this good news to the congregation?

Chris: Especially because Revelation is so rich in imagery, it’s so full of songs and poems, I think it’s important to think about engaging this passage in the context of a whole worship service. So, I will answer your question about preaching, but I would just encourage, there are so many hymns and praise songs that draw on the text of this, the text of this book. Yes, there are so many prayers that are written in this book that we can pray again and learn to pray. So, I would really try to immerse the entire service in Revelation. Because at the end of the day, what John’s after is, he wants to shift our perspective on the world, give us a new orientation to it, and we can do some of that work discursively, in a sermon. God’s given us art and poetry and song, and Revelation is even using that, and it’s not a coincidence. But the way that God will grab and renew our imagination, will include all of those different media,

Anthony: and I would say, as you mentioned previously, iconography as well, as a way to visualize what’s being pictured here.

Chris: Yes. Yes. Some, I have heard some say, that this is the most visual book in the Bible. It’s full of images, and I think that’s right. And so, to let some art engage our interpretation is entirely fitting, for Revelation especially. But let me dive into the sermon portion of a worship service here.

So, if I was preaching this text, I’d do a couple things as I was approaching it. I would really want to set it in the context of the problem that it’s responding to. So, this praise of the Lamb, “worthy is the Lamb that was slaughtered” — actually responding to the question that John asked up in verses two and three, “who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals”, or rather that’s what the angel asked.

And John is weeping because no one steps forward to do this. And what that’s responding to in the text, this moment in the text, is this challenge. What if we are stuck in the endless cycle of violence, destruction, futility that we are in? What if we’re stuck there? And that’s what verses two and three of this chapter put before us.

When the Lamb steps forward, when the Lamb is found worthy, that is good news for all sorts of reasons. But in the plot of this chapter, it’s because the Lamb is the One who will move the story forward. God is not going to give up on this world. As broken and as full of suffering as it is, it is not outside of the reach of God. And it is the Lamb, the One who gave his life for the world, who is worthy to move the story forward into a new chapter. So, it’s not as if Revelation happens, the whole drama of Revelation happens, because God finally runs out of patience and now his anger is let loose on the world or something like that here.

The One who moves the story forward is the One who is totally defined by his love for what he made — his perfect love, his jealous love. But it is the life of the Lamb of God that moves history forward in Revelation. That’s what this scene puts before us.

If I was going to preach about that, I would want to linger on what we are waiting for and what it is that will move the story of this world, the story of our lives forward. Because I think John is giving us a deeply encouraging word, but we have to be in touch with how stuck we are in order to do that. We’re taking for granted here that people may have in their ear the situation of the churches that we’ve already read about in Revelation two and three. These are churches that, they’re in all sorts of situations, but what they have in common is a need to hold fast to Jesus at this time. Some are suffering, some are being persecuted and died. Some are wealthy and complacent. They’re all being called back to Jesus, to this fresh understanding of who he is and recommitment to him for the unique struggle of following him in their situation.

I think the third thing I’d want to hit on if I was opening up this passage for a congregation is, I would want to talk about the “all-ness” of this passage, the comprehensive scope of what Jesus offers every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them. Sing praise. This is good news to everyone and there is no other story of the world, for the world, than this one here.

If I might say one more thing, Anthony.

Anthony: Sure.

Chris: I wouldn’t want to let go of what we talked about in that first question about the importance of the Lamb being the image we’ve seen there. I once heard a music album, a jazz album, reviewed. And the reviewer, he had this perfect line. He said that the musician — he plays the wrong note, but he puts it in the right place.

And I feel like it’s important to let John play the wrong note, shock us with the image of the Lamb in the exact perfect place, in the midst of our longing, in the midst, when we’re wondering who will move the story of our lives forward. Are we one scientific discovery from getting over cancer or are we one administration away from being able to solve our political problems?

It’s not going to be cleverness or our strengths that save us. It is going to be the Lamb. And John puts what might feel emotionally to us like the wrong note here by putting the slain Lamb at the center of this image. But he puts it in exactly the right place. And I think that’s what Revelation calls us to understand and to trust.

Anthony: Well said, Chris. And, as I’m looking over this text, and you mentioned this, all creatures are singing with full voice. So, would you like to sing one of those hymns you mentioned before? Could this be a world presentation of Chris Blumhofer singing a song on this podcast?

Chris: No. I don’t think so. We’re going to pass on it. I don’t have one that comes immediately to mind, so I’m going to pass on that. Thank you.

Anthony: Okay. Fair enough. Let me ask you this, just one last follow up question. It, Revelation, has been often misunderstood. If you could encapsulate what John is really trying to accomplish in a sentence or two through this Revelation, what would it be?

Chris: It is that Jesus is much closer than we think. And that he is completely engaged in the history and story of this world in our lives. I see the book of Revelation structured in a series of sort of waves. The first wave is chapters one through three where Jesus comes to the church. He’s right there walking amid the church, speaking to the churches.

And this passage we’re in now in chapter 4–11 is this second wave of Jesus coming to the world. Moving history forward with this scroll, with the scroll that is being opened. In the final wave, Jesus comes against the great enemy Satan, who’s manifest in the world, but is actually a spiritual power behind it.

But in each of these movements of the text, Jesus is much closer and much more engaged than it might feel like he is if you are on the ground suffering. And so, John is opening up our eyes. Or as I sometimes say, when I teach this class, he’s giving us this pair of glasses that we can put on and all of a sudden, we can see the world in full color, and it is much more colorful than we imagined beforehand. Yes.

Anthony: Hallelujah. Praise God. And that leads me to believe, Chris, that in its final summation, Revelation is good news, because at the center of it is the Lamb. And so, if you hear anyone with a hermeneutic that leads you to believe that Revelation is bad news, look again. Put on those glasses Chris mentioned and see the color that is before us and the person of Jesus Christ.